The Luscious Locks of OG Geralt of Rivia

It's one of my summer traditions to completely re-play one of my favorite gaming series--usually that's a toss up between Mass Effect and The Witcher.  This summer I've opted for The Witcher and I'm currently working my way through the "enhanced version" of the original 2008 game.  Sometimes older games age like fine wine...and sometimes they get a bit like vinegar--I'm finding a bit of both in my re-re-re-play experience.  Here are some random thoughts, feelings, and reflections I've had as I've bounced back and forth between feeling irritated at certain outdated (or obnoxious) gameplay elements and feeling like I'm genuinely having a good time.

Check out Geralt's gorgeous hair!

1.) Geralt has beautiful hair in the original Witcher.

Sure, it's 2008 hair, so you don't get any of the individual strands or have the ability to enable any special "hair effect" settings in the menu, but he's got some luscious layers happening.  A strange part of me wishes that you could give Geralt his OG hair in the third game (you can't...it's always parted in the middle which isn't exactly what I want).

2.) F*$& the swamps.

Every time I get to chapter 2 (and then, unfortunately it also extends into chapter 3) I internally groan at the fact that I'm going to have to navigate poor Geralt through the most annoying zone in the game.  I hate the swamps with a passion--the constant appearance of drowners, drowned dead, and bloedzuigers gets so obnoxious that I eventually give up engaging with them and mostly just run poor Geralt around with a parade of monsters following him.  The way the zone is designed also makes me hate it--rarely can you navigate in a straight line and instead have to run around in a very indirect manner.

3.) Somehow I managed to screw up the investigation in chapter 2.

For some reason I missed/skipped the fun/party mission with Shani until the very, very end of the chapter.  Because of this fact, I ended up accusing the wrong person (something that I've never done before in multiple playthroughs) and somehow managing to confuse myself.  It all got sorted once I completed Shani's mission, but woooow, I guess it had been longer than I thought since I re-played it.

4.) Combat has never been a particularly strong suit in the series, but the first game is a solid reminder of how far it evolved.

If you need a refresher about how combat works in the first game--Geralt has multiple "stances" that the player must manually select.  Certain enemies are more susceptible to specific stances.  Once you've settled on the correct "stance," combat is a timing-based affair that involves staring at a small sword-shaped cursor symbol that lights up when the next attack in a chain is ready to go--basically, you're clicking away...and that's much of the extent of it.  Yeah, it's real bad (and thank baby Jesus that they scrapped this system in the later games).

5.) For its day, there were some pretty advanced mechanics present in the game.

I strongly remember booting it up in 2008 and thinking "OMG these graphics are sooo good!"  That's laughable now, but in its day...pretty awesome.  There are other mechanics in the game that I don't remember being in other games--namely the fact that NPC's have a schedule based on the in-game time and that they react to weather and player actions around them.  This is commonplace in RPG's now, but it's crazy to think that they were doing it back in 2008.

6.) Triss' makeover in the subsequent games in the series was much needed.

Triss is so pushy, demanding, and very sorceress-like in the first game.  (When it comes to the women in the first game...yeah, there are some issues that have been heavily discussed and panned)  I am a fan of the more softened, less-pushy Triss from the later games.  Plus, there's really only room for one pushy sorceress and we all know who that is...

I would encourage anyone who hasn't played the original Witcher in awhile to give it a go.  You'll feel simultaneously annoyed, nostalgic, and maybe even a bit reflective.  It's a good reminder about how far the series has come.